Any beneficial uses for tritium ?

[Externet]

Japan is dumping tritium to the sea. 

Is there some use that can be of benefit for mankind ?   Can it be concentrated embedded in -say glass- or concrete, or something and kept safe; perhaps retrievable if the future needs it ?

[swansont]

It’s used to light up “exit” signs where electricity isn’t readily available.

https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/fs-tritium.html

Long-term storage is problematic since it decays away (12.3 year half-life)

[Externet]

Thanks.  What about batteries; would them last a dozen years ?  Fukushima was a dozen years ago; would that be a reason to dare disposing that spent? tritium now, from its little use remaining ?

---> https://www.ebay.com/itm/185770017355

[swansont]

8 hours ago, Externet said:

Thanks.  What about batteries; would them last a dozen years ?  Fukushima was a dozen years ago; would that be a reason to dare disposing that spent? tritium now, from its little use remaining ?

---> https://www.ebay.com/itm/185770017355

Yes, such batteries exist 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betavoltaic_device

Separating tritiated water is difficult and might not be cost-effective at low concentrations. If you do mass separation you’ll also get water with O-18, which has the same mass. So there’s probably a threshold below which it’s not worth the effort.

[mistermack]

From what I remember from reading about fusion, Tritium is hard to confine and hazardous in it's useful form. I don't know the reasons for that, but making Tritium available in useful form and quantities is one of the aspects of nuclear fusion that is currently being actively researched and developed. 

It doesn't appear that producing it from low concentrations in the usual nuclear reactors is viable, as it's being discharged to the oceans around the globe at present. This is an interesting extract from the wikipedia page on tritium. France is dumping significant quantities : 

[Sensei]

Quote

Any beneficial uses for tritium ?

Tritium is the fuel-to-be for future fusion reactors.

The decay product of Tritium is Helium-3, which is also a fuel-to-be for future fusion reactors. But unlike Tritium it is stable. Even if it would not be used as a fusion fuel it can be used for the same purposes as Helium-4.

[swansont]

One method of tritium production is from neutron activation of lithium-6, yielding an alpha and tritium. Heavy-water reactors like CANDU will separate/recover tritium, but that’s going to have a higher concentration of tritiated water than a light-water reactor.

[John Cuthber]

All "uses" are beneficial from someone's point of view. The usefulness of H bomb production is a matter of opinion and probably off-topic.
Tritium is a very valuable material.
The problem with the waste-water from Fukushima is that it's neither dilute enough to be "harmless", not concentrated enough to be useful.

China has been very hypocritical in its criticism of Japan.
China "dumps" waste with higher tritium levels than Japan is proposing to.

Tritium is also one of the least problematic radioisotopes simply because, like water, it rapidly runs through the body and out.
The radioactive 1/2 life may be 12 years but the biological 1/2 life is only 10 days.
It also has a very low decay energy. You can get higher energy electrons in a big colour TV.

[mistermack]

51 minutes ago, John Cuthber said:

China "dumps" waste with higher tritium levels than Japan is proposing to.

The levels in the waste are not the relevant factor though. If A is dumping waste at half the level of B, but at double the rate, then the effect is the same in both. Level times rate is what's relevant. From the wikipedia figure above, China looks to be well down the list, and France is out on it's own in discharge rates. ( Although Japan isn't included in the list )

[John Cuthber]

10 minutes ago, mistermack said:

The levels in the waste are not the relevant factor though. If A is dumping waste at half the level of B, but at double the rate, then the effect is the same in both. Level times rate is what's relevant. From the wikipedia figure above, China looks to be well down the list, and France is out on it's own in discharge rates. ( Although Japan isn't included in the list )

So, Japan's one-off dumping is less of a problem than China's ongoing one.

If WIKI is to be believed then
"In 2021, the Japanese cabinet approved the dumping of ALPS-treated water containing 1.8 g (0.1 oz) of tritium"
That's 1800mg
And that's less than the sum of the two UK figures in that table.
1115 +1342
 

[mistermack]

22 minutes ago, John Cuthber said:

"In 2021, the Japanese cabinet approved the dumping of ALPS-treated water containing 1.8 g (0.1 oz) of tritium"
That's 1800mg

They don't say if that's per day, per year, or per the 30 year time period, so it doesn't really tell you much. The UK figure is for a year, as are the others, so you can compare them like with like. 

I'm sure that the amounts released are not going to be harmful, I've read comments that the background level will be virtually unchanged. 

[swansont]

The raw amount is meaningless without knowing the concentration, and the resulting activity per liter. 1.8 g of tritium in a liter of water is quite different than the same amount in 10,000 liters

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/japan-release-fukushima-water-into-ocean-starting-aug-24-2023-08-22/

“The water will initially be released in smaller portions and with extra checks, with the first discharge totalling 7,800 cubic metres over about 17 days…

That water will contain about 190 becquerels of tritium per litre, below the World Health Organisation drinking water limit of 10,000 becquerels per litre, according to Tepco”

 

[John Cuthber]

2 hours ago, mistermack said:

They don't say if that's per day, per year, or per the 30 year time period,

That's the whole "stock".
If they let it out in one day it will still be less this year than the UK dumped this year.
If it's over the course of a year, it's less than the UK dumped in a year.
If it's over 30 years then it's 30 times less than the UK dumped per year. (Actually, it's rather  less because of decay)

However you slice it, it's not much stuff.

[mistermack]

3 hours ago, John Cuthber said:

That's the whole "stock".

I couldn't find that information. Can you link to it ? 

[swansont]

The article I linked to said the planned release is 22 TBq per year. 1 mole has an activity of about 1.1 10^15 Bq, so 1.8 g is ~660 TBq. Of course, the tritium will decay over that time. 

 

[mistermack]

Yes, the multiple different units don't help with comparison, but the comparison given to the tap water limits is really telling.

On top of that is the fact that the biological half-life is so short for Tritium, so it's not going to build up in fish, in the way that mercury can. If I was living in the area, I'd be far more interested in mercury levels, when buying fish. 

[John Cuthber]

20 hours ago, mistermack said:

I couldn't find that information. Can you link to it ? 

P 20 here might be a better estimate of the total.

https://www.meti.go.jp/earthquake/nuclear/pdf/140424/140424_02_008.pdf
It says it's about 10^16 Bq